Wealth fund newbie comes into focus in $1 trillion sovereign hub

Wealth fund newbie comes into focus in $1 trillion sovereign hub

For all the buzz around Abu Dhabi's newest wealth fund, the size of ADQ has been harder to pin down.

A new report from Global SWF has put a number for the first time on how much the sovereign investor has amassed. Through the transfer of government holdings including the domestic stock exchange, alongside a series of investments, ADQ now oversees $110bn in assets, according to estimates by the New York-based data firm and adviser.

Even in a city that's among the few globally to manage around $1 trillion in sovereign wealth capital, ADQ has been making waves as one of the Gulf region's most dynamic and deal-hungry investors, morphing in a short time from a relatively obscure holding company first known as ADDHC.

ADQ has also become Abu Dhabi's go-to fund to accelerate the economic diversification of one of the world's top oil exporters. Set up in 2018, it owns companies across the emirate's non-oil economy, from a stake in a regional food giant, film studios and a steel producer to a low-cost airline and the entity that oversees the nuclear energy program of the United Arab Emirates.

"We have been monitoring ADQ for some time now and we are impressed by